Post by gwiz on Feb 3, 2006 4:36:40 GMT -4

It's 40 years ago today that the Soviet probe Luna 9 performed the first successful soft landing on the moon, using a combination of braking rockets and an air bag. It carried a panoramic TV camera which took three pans of the surroundings and a radiation detector. By luck, it settled slightly between pans, giving stereo views. The Soviets were slow to release the pictures, and were scooped to the release by Jodrell Bank radio observatory, aided by the loan of a fax printer from a national newspaper.

Post by PhantomWolf on Feb 5, 2006 12:15:36 GMT -4

TV camera which took three pans of the surroundings and a radiation detector.

Why did they take a pan of the radiation detector?

It must be fun to lead a life completely unburdened by reality. -- JayUtah

"On two occasions, I have been asked, 'Pray, Mr. Babbage, if you put into the machine wrong figures, will the right answers come out?' I am not able to rightly apprehend the kind of confusion of ideas that could provoke such a question." -- Charles Babbage (1791-1871)

Post by gwiz on Feb 22, 2006 5:00:05 GMT -4

40 years ago the Soviets launched Kosmos 110. So what? It was actually a Voskhod manned spacecraft modified to carry two dogs and other biological samples. The high point of the orbit was at 880 km, so the craft repeatedly entered the lower Van Allen belt during its three-week flight. The dogs were exposed to a total radiation dose of 12 rad, more than ten times that experienced by any Apollo astronaut, and more than any human crew received until over ten years later, when space station missions lasting several months became possible.

Multiple exclamation marks are a sure sign of a diseased mind - Terry Pratchett...the ascent module ... took off like a rocket - Moon Man

Post by gwiz on Mar 16, 2006 4:27:28 GMT -4

Another 40th anniversary today - Gemini 8 and the first docking of two satellites in orbit, a vital technique for Apollo. The Commander was Neil Armstrong, making his first space flight, and his co-pilot was another rookie, Dave Scott, who later flew on Apollos 9 and 15.

After successfully carrying out the rendezvous manoeuvres and docking with the Agena target vehicle, the assembly started to rotate. Undocking proved that the problem was with Gemini rather than Agena, as the problem got worse, reaching an eye-watering revolution per second. Armstrong activated a second attitude control system that was only supposed to be used during re-entry and regained control. Having activated the re-entry control system, he was obliged to return as soon as possible, and successfully made it down to a reserve splash-down location in the Pacific.

Multiple exclamation marks are a sure sign of a diseased mind - Terry Pratchett...the ascent module ... took off like a rocket - Moon Man

Post by gwiz on Apr 3, 2006 3:31:13 GMT -4

Today is 40 years since Luna 10 became the first artificial satellite of the Moon. The Soviet probe used the same basic design as the Luna 9 lander, but instead of the surface capsule it carried a small satellite instrumented to measure the radiation environment, meteorites and magnetic fields.

Curiously, it didn't discover a "searing radiation hell" or cause the immediate cancellation of the Soviet manned moon programme.

Multiple exclamation marks are a sure sign of a diseased mind - Terry Pratchett...the ascent module ... took off like a rocket - Moon Man

Post by gwiz on Jun 2, 2006 3:01:41 GMT -4

Today's 40th anniversary is of the Surveyor 1 landing on the moon, the first pure rocket-powered touchdown anywhere as the earlier Soviet Luna 9 had used a rocket plus airbag technique.

HBs might note the ability to control the vehicle in spite of the rocket nozzles being at the bottom, the crisp footprints in the lunar dust and the survival of the craft through several lunar day/night thermal cycles.

It was a good week for NASA. The following day Gemini 9A was launched. The crew successfully carried out three rendezvous exercises including the first rendezvous from above with the target hard to see against the earth background. This was a test of what the Apollo CSM crewman would have had to do if the LM had been unable to manoeuvre after taking off from the moon.

Multiple exclamation marks are a sure sign of a diseased mind - Terry Pratchett...the ascent module ... took off like a rocket - Moon Man

Post by gwiz on Jul 5, 2006 3:24:47 GMT -4

40 years ago NASA launched their AS-203 mission, the first orbital flight of the Saturn IB vehicle. There was no payload apart from a lot more propellant than needed for orbit, giving the S-IVB upper stage a mass of 26 tonnes, a record for the time. The main purpose was to investigate the control of the propellants in orbit, as would be required on Apollo for the period between launch and trans-lunar injection. To this end small rockets were fired continuously to maintain a small acceleration and keep the propellants settled in their tanks. At the end of the mission the tank pressures were allowed to increase in a test of ultimate structural strength.

Multiple exclamation marks are a sure sign of a diseased mind - Terry Pratchett...the ascent module ... took off like a rocket - Moon Man

Post by gwiz on Jul 18, 2006 3:21:18 GMT -4

40 years ago today saw the launch of Gemini 10. Major firsts included a double rendezvous, first with its own Agena target, then with the Gemini 8 target, use of the target propulsion system to manoeuvre the docked combination and an altitude record of 750 km. The crew, Young and Collins, stayed in the high orbit for nearly a day, getting a radiation dose from the Van Allen belts of nearly 1 rem, the highest yet for a manned flight. Collins' EVA to retrieve an experiment from the Gemini 8 target showed that such a task was more difficult than anticipated due to a tendancy to float away.

Multiple exclamation marks are a sure sign of a diseased mind - Terry Pratchett...the ascent module ... took off like a rocket - Moon Man